Muhammad Ali

When people think of Muhammad Ali, I hope the boxing comes to mind second. I agree completely that he was The Greatest, the best boxer who ever lived. But I hope his courage is what people will remember first.
He was brave enough to stand up against the Viet Nam war in 1967. He refused to be inducted. He refused to run away to Canada. He was ready to go to jail. He lost his title. He lost his livelihood. He lost three years that would have been, as good as he was before and after, his best years as an athlete. 
He was reviled. He was hated, passionately. White people, and many black people, had no use for him, whatsoever. And he knew that was going to happen. He took it all on. He did it before Eugene McCarthy and Robert Kennedy broke with President Johnson over Viet Nam. He did it three weeks after Martin Luther King, Jr., delivered his sermon "Beyond Vietnam" at the Riverside Church in New York City. (Dr. King would be murdered one year to the day from the moment of that sermon.)
He had been a friend of Malcolm X, before they had a falling out. He was a friend of Dr. King, as the FBI's wiretaps of Dr. King documented. He was acquainted with Jacqueline Kennedy, and certainly aware of Robert Kennedy's assassination. He knew what the cost could be, of standing up for what he believed. 
He did it anyway. 
He told the truth, with courage. He would not go to kill Vietnamese people, people, he declared, who had never called him that N word. Black people in America in 1967 had seen the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act enacted into law, but they had not seen them enforced throughout the nation. They certainly had not seen the hearts and minds of all Americans changed. The black people of Ali's generation had seen fathers and uncles and friends come back from fighting for America in World War II, and as soon as they got home, be reminded that they were not equal, and they certainly were not genuinely free by any definition. 
He stood up. With courage. Knowing the consequences.  
And he paid the price. He lost. He lost a lot.   
But then he won. 
The Supreme Court reversed his conviction. He fought again. He became the champion again. And he became beloved. And did it all without the loss of his integrity. Because of his courage.